Weekend Economists Out on an Idle Idol Idyll November 15-17, 2013

Today's theme is Idleness, especially in contrast to the Capitalist Work Ethic (for it has gone way beyond the Protestant work ethic, which did allow for rewards on earth like wages, time off, holidays, etc...) We have Ghost Dog out in Iberia, to thank for the topic.

If you can put two brain cells together, after such an exhausting week, you can join in, too! Tell us what you are best at NOT doing, or where, or when...or help mock the frantic Banksters and their entourages, as they try to abandon a sinking ship, only to find all the dry land is under water and their baggage drags them under.

Bring us mythic, dreamy music and tuneful myths. Eat lotus! Kick back and enjoy the Weekend.

1. The Ideal Idle Idol Idyl--a story of homophones

An idol is an object of worship. The word functions only as a noun. Idle has several definitions, including (1) inactive, (2) to pass time without doing work, (3) to run (a motor vehicle) while out of gear or not in motion, (4) to make inactive, and (5) a state of idling. It’s usually an adjective, but senses two, three, and four make it a verb, and sense five makes it also a noun.

There’s also the rarer idyll, which refers to (1) a tranquil natural scene, (2) a carefree episode, and (3) a short, pastoral poem. This word is also not to be confused with ideal.

Other than their similarity in sound and pronunciation, the three words have nothing in common. Idle has Germanic roots and is documented in English (Old English, to be precise) as long ago as the ninth century. Idol goes back to the Latin idolum, which in turn comes from a corresponding Greek word. Idyll derives from Latin and Greek words for short, descriptive poems. Idol and idyll are much newer in English than idle; idol entered the language around the 14th century, idyll a couple of centuries later.

Rest is not idleness, and to lie sometimes on the grass under trees on a summer's day, listening to the murmur of the water, or watching the clouds float across the sky, is by no means a waste of time.--John Lubbock

Know the true value of time; snatch, seize, and enjoy every moment of it. No idleness, no laziness, no procrastination: never put off till tomorrow what you can do today.--Lord Chesterfield

Far from idleness being the root of all evil, it is rather the only true good.--Soren Kierkegaard

3. Trans-Pacific Partnership: "We Will Not Obey"; Building a Global Resistance Movement

We are in a time of transformational change. The opportunity is here to reverse the destruction wrought by rigged corporate trade agreements and to demand trade that is fair and promotes sustainable practices. There is no reason trade cannot improve the lives of workers and people around the world, as well as protect the planet from the rapacious destruction of corporate greed. We need to insist that people and the planet come before profits.

It is up to us to make this transformation a reality. To do so we must build a broad-based, movement of movements that sends a clear message to Washington, DC: "If you pass the Trans-Pacific Partnership, we will not obey."

The Obama administration has made it a priority to have the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) completed by the end of the year. The TPP is the largest trade agreement negotiated since the World Trade Organization (WTO). It covers 12 countries so far and includes provisions that reach beyond issues of trade. The full contents of the TPP are unknown because it has been negotiated with unprecedented secrecy; however, it is clear from what has been revealed that the TPP gives transnational corporations the power to alter our laws down to the local level to enhance and protect their profits.

To pass the TPP, Obama is seeking Fast Track Trade Promotion Authority from Congress, which would give the president the ability to negotiate and sign the agreement before it is presented to Congress for a limited debate and an up-or-down vote without amendments. Fast Track, which has been used to pass other undesirable trade deals like the WTO and NAFTA, would prohibit a transparent and democratic process. Without Fast Track, it would be more difficult to pass the TPP...

AN IMPORTANT, MUST READ ARTICLE!

As we come marching, marching in the beauty of the day,
A million darkened kitchens, a thousand mill lofts gray,
Are touched with all the radiance that a sudden sun discloses,
For the people hear us singing: "Bread and roses! Bread and roses!"
As we come marching, marching, we battle too for men,
For they are women's children, and we mother them again.
Our lives shall not be sweated from birth until life closes;
Hearts starve as well as bodies; give us bread, but give us roses!

As we come marching, marching, unnumbered women dead
Go crying through our singing their ancient cry for bread.
Small art and love and beauty their drudging spirits knew.
Yes, it is bread we fight for -- but we fight for roses, too!

As we come marching, marching, we bring the greater days.
The rising of the women means the rising of the race.
No more the drudge and idler -- ten that toil where one reposes,
But a sharing of life's glories: Bread and roses! Bread and roses!

4. My winter depression is setting in

and it was compounded by a rare cloudy day here in the high desert, so I'm best at procrastinating these days. I did get a little active last night and write out some important checks. I didn't get active enough to address envelopes, find stamps, and mail the buggers. Maybe I'll do that tonight so they'll all go out tomorrow.

14. I've had two.

16. haha, I am the wife

Sorry, was overwhelmed with too many things to do. Why can't husbands see the everyday chores that always need to be done? Oh, I ask, and he will do them, BUT why can't husbands see a sink full of dirty dishes, they can't see dust on tables (top and bottom), they can't see 8 pairs of muddy dog feet.
Today I need to get groceries, because husband can't see we are out of bread and milk. Sure, if I asked, he would go, but then he'd also get 20 boxes of Frosted Flakes.
Aaargh.

27. It could be worse

You could have one who points out the dust on the table tops but leaves the room when told where the dust rags and furniture polish are, mentions that dirty dishes are taking up the sink where he wants to wash his shoes but insists his hands are too sensitive for dish soap, complains that we don't have his favorite bread (the most expensive in the store) of which he will eat one or maybe two slices when we do have it, demands that dog feet be hosed off and hand dried and the vacuum run anywhere they might have stepped. . . . and then constantly mutters that I spend too much time chatting with computer friends while he lies on the couch watching basketball (college and pro), football (college and pro), baseball (college, pro, high school, Little League, girls softball), hockey, AND old westerns.

And people wonder why I'm not married to him?

P.S. He does do a good job on the yard work, sometimes even without being told.

33. I don't have time for the hunt

The odds of a woman over 40 being killed by a terrorist are better than those of her marrying. The odds that she's marrying a terrorist are 50:50....

Monday, July 06, 2009

The "more likely to be killed by a terrorist than marry after 40" myth

Have you seen Sleepless in Seattle? Remember the line: “It’s easier to get killed by a terrorist than to get married after 40”? Where does that come from? Well, it comes from a 1986 Newsweek cover story. In 1986, Newsweek reported on an unpublished study and said that by age forty, a single, educated career woman is more likely to be “killed by a terrorist” than to ever get married. Supposedly they had a 2.6% chance of getting married. The study argued that “white, college-educated women born in the mid-1950s who are still single at 30 have only a 20 percent chance of marrying. By the age of 35 the odds drop to 5 percent.” This study was widely quoted. The only problem was that it was totally wrong.

A Census Bureau report from about the same time found that single women at 30 had a 66% likelihood of getting married, not 20%, and at 40 had a 23% probability of marriage, not 2.6%.

The killed by a terrorist line wasn’t based on any research on terrorism. It was an exaggeration on Newsweek’s part, not a statistical finding of the study. It was written as a funny aside in an internal reporting memo by Newsweek’s San Francisco correspondent Pamela Abramson. She said years later, "It's true--I am responsible for the single most irresponsible line in the history of journalism, all meant in jest." In New York, writer Eloise Salholz inserted the line into the story. "It was never intended to be taken literally," says Salholz. But most readers missed the joke.

Newsweek finally retracted this “killed by a terrorist” claim twenty years later, in May 2006. Twenty years after the original article, they reported: "Those odds-she'll-marry statistics turned out to be too pessimistic: today it appears that about 90 percent of baby-boomer men and women either have married or will marry, a ratio that's well in line with historical averages."

The new article now says that the odds of getting married after 40 are more than 40%. And contrary to earlier projections that college educated women are less likely to marry, it’s now much more likely for women with college degrees to marry than not. A 2004 study says that of female college graduates born between 1960 and 1964, 97.4% will marry.

The original 1986 article looked at 14 women who were single and supposedly more likely to be killed by a terrorist. Twenty years later, Newsweek managed to track down 11 of the 14. Eight are married and three remain single. In other words, 72% of those eleven got married. One got married at age 40 and remains blissfully married at age 50. Several have children or stepchildren. None divorced. And none have been killed by a terrorist.

In the mid-1980s, a now infamous Newsweek article declared that a single, college-educated 40-year-old woman was more likely to die in a terrorist attack than ever walk down the aisle. The claim, repeated in movies and sitcoms, convinced generations of women that if they weren’t married by 40, it probably wasn’t going to happen.

The debate was revived again last week when a study from the Pew Research Center reported that high earning, college-educated women have a dwindling pool of like-minded marriage partners.

Now, a briefing paper from the Council on Contemporary Families is trying to set the record straight about marriage, education and women. For college-educated women who hope to marry someday, the news is good.

In the paper, the economists Betsey Stevenson and Adam Isen of the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School analyze marriage data from the Census and the 2008 American Community Survey. They note that historically, women with a college degree have been the “least likely” group of women to ever marry, but those numbers have been changing with each passing decade.

In 1950, 90 percent of white female high school graduates had married by age 40, but fewer than 75 percent of college-educated white women had tied the knot by that age. By 1980, college-educated women began marrying at higher rates and closing the education-marriage gap. That year, 92 percent of 40-year-old white female college graduates had married, compared with 96 percent of similar high school graduates.

Since then, marriage rates have fallen for all women, but now the chance of marriage by 40 is about the same with or without a college degree. In 2008, 86 percent of 40-year-old white female college graduates were married, compared to 88 percent of those with only a high school degree. Women who drop out of high school are the least likely to marry, and college educated women are the least likely to divorce.

The report also shed light on the marriage-over-40 question. It found that college-educated women who are unmarried at age 40 are twice as likely to marry in the next 10 years as unmarried 40-year-olds with just a high school degree. Among 40-year-old white women who had never married in 1990, 20 percent of the college graduates went on to marry within 10 years, compared to just 10 percent of those with a high school degree.

Educated women are also more likely to report being happy in their marriages than less educated women, the report concluded.

The story is different for African-American women. Overall marriage rates are lower among African-Americans, but black women don’t incur a “marriage penalty” when they pursue college degrees. Among black women, 70 percent of college graduates are married by 40, whereas only about 60 percent of black high school graduates are married by that age.

Notably, whether a man marries is less influenced by education, and men show similar marriage rates across all education groups. However, from 1980 to 2008, white males with any college education were more likely to marry than those who had never gone to college. Among black men in 2008, 76 percent of black male college grads were married by 40, compared to just 63 percent of high school graduates.

Dr. Stevenson said the shifts in marriage are occurring at a time when couples are less likely to marry for financial security or economic benefits and more likely to choose partners based on the “companion benefits” of marriage. She calls it the rise of the “hedonic marriage.”

“That’s marriage where you’re together for the joy of having another person to share your life with,” Dr. Stevenson said. “That’s where marriage is headed — couples who are together because they enjoy life more when they’re together.”

Well, I've been married, and while the terrorism may have been only personal and family-directed, one psychopath is enough. The point isn't MARRIAGE, after all, it's HAPPILY EVER AFTER.

50. This is why you're still married.

I grocery shopped, cooked dinner, cleaned the house and did the yard work besides having a full time job. Are we still married? No.
I've come to the conclusion some women are simply unhappy when it comes to being married despite what is done or is not done by their husband. I know some married women who have a rooster of verifiable complaints about their other half and they would not consider leaving as making their spouse as miserable as possible has taken on a life of its own.
There are just as many who given the opportunity would bolt given a reasonable prospect for a future on their own. My first ex planned on divorcing me when she completed nursing school. Smart woman that she is waited until we bought a house. A half dozen years later she remarried and divorced him two years later. She remains single to this day.
Number two is now on marriage number four. I kept the house this time as she had no interest in it as she married up. He died ten years later. She sold everything and moved and managed to find number four a year later. In that last three marriages, we shared two things in common among the husbands, we were older and financially better off than the previous husband.
I am much better off for having known both. My life was richer in ways that aren't about things, but some things do matter. I live by myself and I'm very comfortable with that.
The best relationships I have now are not dependent on being marriageable. They are constructed on simple premise, we should be able to smile when we see each other.

...On Wednesday, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is slated to issue a notice of proposed rulemaking to modernize the legal framework governing debt collection. The government watchdog is seeking public and business comment before formally proposing the rules, which are expected to be finalized by next year. The bureau is asking Americans whether creditors and collection agencies are providing accurate information about their outstanding debts. It also wants to know whether people are receiving threatening calls at all hours of the night or being dragged into court for money they do not owe.

“Collection of consumer debts serves an important role in the proper functioning of consumer credit markets,” CFPB Director Richard Cordray said Tuesday on a call with reporters. “But certain debt collection practices have long been a source of frustration for many consumers.”

Cordray noted that since the bureau began accepting debt collection complaints in July, it has received about 5,000 consumer grievances. The most-common complaints involve harassing phone calls, lack of verification of the debt and people becoming aware of a collection account only through their credit report...

6. 5 states where homeowners lost the most money / Home values plummeted by $100,000 in many areas

...New data released on Thursday by the U.S. Census Bureau shows the dramatic effects that the recession had on real estate values. Nationally, homes lost 9% of their median values from what the Census describes as the three-year recession period (2007-09) through the three-year post-recession period (2010-12), according to the report, dropping from $191,900 to $174,600....In many markets, including Las Vegas, Miami and Phoenix — where median prices have risen 21% to 32% in one year — investors account for about 30% to 40% of home purchases over the past three years, says Jack McCabe, an independent housing analyst in Deerfield Beach, Fla. These are mostly hedge funds and high-net-worth individuals who have been buying homes at rock-bottom prices and mostly renting them out. Buyers from abroad who are purchasing vacation homes and pied-a-terre’s are also fueling purchases...

13. Mañana Habit

The Mañana Habit is something that we have learned from the Spaniards. The word "Mañana" means ‘tomorrow’ or ‘specified future time’ also known as “procrastination” in plain English, “mamaya na” in Filipino.

How it Works:

You need to do something now.
But then you decide to do it later.
As a result of the delay, you end up not doing it.
Now, you tell yourself or somebody that you will do it tomorrow.
Tomorrow comes. The same cycle happens.

A habit is a pattern of behavior that is acquired through frequent repetition. No amount of planning or preparation can change this. The only way to change a habit is to replace it with another habit.

My father taught me these words when I was still young:

"Do it now"…"Don’t wait till tomorrow".

At that time, I didn’t see the value of that advice. It was too pushy or overbearing to hear. But then, later on I realized that it was a valuable habit that he was teaching me.

Now, when you really need to get something done you need to get it done sooner rather than later, usually. But what about all those times when you later realise you didn't need to do or really shouldn't have done what you did, and when, if you'd left it 'tilll tomorrow, you'd have realised that, or an even better opportunity to do something useful would have come along?

Amid reports of hunger and destitution across the central islands of the Philippines, there is growing popular anger over President Benigno Aquino’s response to the devastation caused by Super Typhoon Yolanda (known internationally as Haiyan). The inadequacy and slowness of the official international response has also become obvious.

Millions of displaced people remain desperately short of food, water, housing and other basic necessities, with some turning to looting to survive. Hospitals lack supplies, leading to fears of disease outbreaks. Distraught families appear regularly on TV news programs, some holding signs reading “Help us” or “We need food.”...

Geithner, 52, who was an architect of the 2009 bank bailout during the financial crisis, plans to join Warburg Pincus, LLC as its president and managing director and will be "expected to work on mapping the firm's strategy and management, investor relations and on matters related to the firm's investments," according to The Journal.

The 40-year-old firm has invested more than $45 billion in 675 companies worldwide, according to its website.

The Journal has more:

Mr. Geithner has long considered a career in investing once his days in Washington ended. He has been reluctant to take a job with any banks, which he once regulated, and views private-equity firms and other investment managers as different from the institutions he oversaw as New York Fed chief.

17. The Chinese Government Looks Like It's Reining Back Its Intense Control Over IPOs

SHANGHAI (Reuters) - China may reduce the influence of the state on stock markets as part of its sweeping reform agenda, including by making it easier for companies to list their stocks and making management of state-owned enterprises more accountable to shareholders.

In a pointer to a winding back of government influence in initial public offerings (IPOs), detailed plans released on Friday night included a pledge to "push forward stock issuance registration system reform" -- a term previously used to refer to the listing process.

In developed economies, the process largely requires a company to register and go through a rigorous audit before investors make a decision on whether or not to buy the stock.

To list in China requires the approval of the China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC). An early test of the leadership's commitment to reform will be if it lifts a year-long suspension of new listings in Shanghai and Shenzhen.

18. Who Are The Winners And Losers Of Global QE?

A research group at McKinsey & Company set out to follow the distribution of money in the economy as a result of post-crisis central banking. The team examined the low-interest rates, and tools — conventional and unconventional — central banks have been using to keep rates low.
From a profit standpoint, the winners included governments, non-financial corporations, and — in the case of the U.S. — banks. Household income, pensions and insurance, and the rest of the world have lost in terms of net interest income.

The researchers examined the policies of the U.S. Federal Reserve, the Bank of England, the European Central Bank, and the Bank of Japan. They outline how originally, the banks adjusted short-term interest rates through conventional measures, and drove the rates down. When they could push no further, having reached “zero lower bound,” the banks used unconventional measures to retain the low-interest levels, including large-scale asset purchases.

This is known as “QE” in the U.S., or the Fed’s bond buying program. At some point in time, all the central banks participated in a similar program. The result, the report says, is that the combined balance sheets for the banks grew between 2007 and the second-quarter of 2013 by $4.7 trillion dollars.

19. A Nuclear Deal With Iran Might Come As Soon As Next Week

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Major powers and Iran are getting closer to an initial agreement to curb Iran's nuclear program, a senior U.S. official said on Friday, adding it is "quite possible" a deal could be reached when negotiators meet November 20-22 in Geneva.
"For the first time in nearly a decade we are getting close to a first-step ... that would stop the Iranian nuclear program from advancing and roll it back in key areas," the official told reporters.

"I don't know if we will reach an agreement. I think it is quite possible that we can, but there are still tough issues to negotiate," said the official, speaking on condition of anonymity.

The official said EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton and Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif were to meet on November 20 in Geneva. They will be joined later the same day by a wider group known as the P5+1 comprising Britain, China, France, Germany, Russia and the United States. The talks are likely to last through November 22, the official added.

We need to be prepared to give up some of our joint dominance of world economic governance to allow emerging economies the space their growing power warrants.

Recent data continue to point to signs of an improving recovery in the UK. What is particularly encouraging is that the latest manufacturing PMI survey suggested rising optimism about exports; questions could still be asked about the balance of growth, but if there are now signs of improving exports this adds to the case for the optimists.

The eurozone is no longer quite the concern it once was and that is probably helping, but the real scope for sustainable export strength lies outside Europe and our historic traditional UK export markets. Sustained strength in exports will probably happen if our companies can penetrate the markets in the far-flung world of the so-called BRIC economies - Brazil, Russia, India and, of course, China - and other large emerging markets.

I discuss this in a short book I am soon to publish and I have also been travelling extensively in the past couple of months for a BBC radio documentary I am making about some of the emerging economies beyond the BRICs: Mexico, Indonesia, Nigeria and Turkey. They could become known as the MINTs.

22. "Mostly, we just stop doing what we’re doing."

On ecological collapse ... and, in a way, the virtues of idleness. Because if we are to save the world (which we're not) we have to move slower, take more time, give up things .... I love it that "This article is an excerpt from Smith's essay, "Capitalism and the destruction of life on Earth," published in the Real-World Economics Review." (bold added)

Published on Friday, November 15, 2013 by Adbusters
'Sleepwalking to Extinction': Capitalism and the Destruction of Life and Earth
by Richard Smith

Capitalism is, overwhelmingly, the main driver of planetary ecological collapse

... From climate change to natural resource overconsumption to pollution, the engine that has powered three centuries of accelerating economic development, revolutionizing technology, science, culture and human life itself is, today, a roaring out-of-control locomotive mowing down continents of forests, sweeping oceans of life, clawing out mountains of minerals, pumping out lakes of fuels, devouring the planet’s last accessible natural resources to turn them into “product,” while destroying fragile global ecologies built up over eons of time. Between 1950 and 2000 the global human population more than doubled from 2.5 to 6 billion. But in these same decades, consumption of major natural resources soared more than sixfold on average, some much more. Natural gas consumption grew nearly twelvefold, bauxite (aluminum ore) fifteenfold. And so on. At current rates, Harvard biologist E.O. Wilson says that “half the world’s great forests have already been leveled and half the world’s plant and animal species may be gone by the end of this century.”

Wilson, I think, is/was much too conservative. Everything is accelerating. Feedback loop on feedback loop. I think much sooner.

We all know what we have to do: suppress greenhouse gas emissions. Stop over-consuming natural resources. Stop the senseless pollution of the earth, waters, and atmosphere with toxic chemicals. Stop producing waste that can’t be recycled by nature. Stop the destruction of biological diversity and ensure the rights of other species to flourish. We don’t need any new technological breakthroughs to solve these problems. Mostly, we just stop doing what we’re doing. But we can’t stop because we’re all locked into an economic system in which companies have to grow to compete and reward their shareholders and because we all need the jobs.

... That’s why, if you listen to environmentalists like Bill McKibben for example, you will get the impression that global warming is mainly driven by fossi- fuel-powered electric power plants, so if we just “switch to renewables” this will solve the main problem and we can carry on with life more or less as we do now. Indeed, “green capitalism” enthusiasts like Thomas Friedman and the union-backed “green jobs” lobby look to renewable energy, electric cars and such as “the next great engine of industrial growth” — the perfect win-win solution. This is a not a solution. This is a delusion: greenhouse gasses are produced across the economy not just by power plants. Globally, fossil-fuel-powered electricity generation accounts for 17% of GHG emissions, heating accounts for 5%, miscellaneous “other” fuel combustion 8.6%, industry 14.7%, industrial processes another 4.3%, transportation 14.3%, agriculture 13.6%, land use changes (mainly deforestation) 12.2%. This means, for a start, that even if we immediately replaced every fossil-fuel-powered electric generating plant on the planet with 100% renewable solar, wind and water power, this would only reduce global GHG emissions by around 17%.

What this means is that, far from launching a new green-energy-powered “industrial growth” boom, barring some tech-fix miracle, the only way to impose “immediate and severe curbs” on fossil fuel production/consumption would be to impose an EMERGENCY CONTRACTION in the industrialized countries: drastically retrench and in some cases shut down industries, even entire sectors, across the economy and around the planet — not just fossil fuel producers but all the industries that consume them and produce GHG emissions — autos, trucking, aircraft, airlines, shipping and cruise lines, construction, chemicals, plastics, synthetic fabrics, cosmetics, synthetic fiber and fabrics, synthetic fertilizer and agribusiness CAFO operations.

... This doesn’t mean we would have to de-industrialize and go back to riding horses and living in log cabins. But it does mean that we would have to abandon the “consumer economy” — shut down all kinds of unnecessary, wasteful and polluting industries from junkfood to cruise ships, disposable Pampers to disposable H&M clothes, disposable IKEA furniture, endless new model cars, phones, electronic games, the lot. Plus all the banking, advertising, junk mail, most retail, etc. We would have completely redesign production to replace “fast junk food” with healthy, nutritious, fresh “slow food,” replace “fast fashion” with “slow fashion,” bring back mending, alterations and local tailors and shoe repairmen. We would have to completely redesign production of appliances, electronics, housewares, furniture and so on to be as durable and long-lived as possible. Bring back appliance repairmen and such. We would have to abolish the throwaway disposables industries, the packaging and plastic bag industrial complex, bring back refillable bottles and the like. We would have to design and build housing to last for centuries, to be as energy efficient as possible, to be reconfigurable, and shareable. We would have to vastly expand public transportation to curb vehicle use but also build those we do need to last and be shareable like Zipcar or Paris’ municipally-owned “Autolib” shared electric cars.

I am not as optimistic as he. I think it might, indeed, mean going back to "riding horses" - metaphorically: horses are probably too energy consumptive given the feed, shelter etc. needs ...

However, I have a faint hope that were we to act we could, in the best case scenario, save science/medicine and communications/education. If we did, we could have bearable lives without 98% of the crap we consume ... maybe. With so many billions to feed ...? I remember the chill I felt reading, some time back, somewhere, of one of the "deep Greens" saying something to the effect of "we all know that the only really sustainable human culture is that of small Hunter-Gatherer bands ..."

23. Why Clever And Lazy Leaders Are More Efficient

For our purposes we’ll credit von Hammerstein-Equord with the quote that he divides his officers into four groups based on their behavioral habits:

There are clever, diligent, stupid, and lazy officers. Usually two characteristics are combined.
So the groups are set as follows:

clever and diligent
stupid and lazy
clever and lazy
stupid and diligent
To map it out into terms of the 21st century, we could see it like this:

Surprisingly, stupid and lazy officers were not seen as the worst of the bunch:

One must beware of anyone who is stupid and diligent — he must not be entrusted with any responsibility because he will always cause only mischief.
This probably applies to those who are diligent but uninformed, as well. The problem being that any work done by these people is unnecessary or pointless—they simply need to be pointed in the right direction by someone else to make their hard work worthwhile.

66. What's the difference between thinking 'War' and thinking 'Peace'?

Between creation and destruction, the positive and the negative, the 'evil' and the 'good'?

I suggest the answer would have to to with an awareness of one's context, as a social human animal living where one lives at the present point on the path of history ('Good', for example, for whom? For me personally (in my social context), for my family? for the wider community, all humanity, the biosphere itself..?), an awareness for the obtention of which 'good' education and access to information helps but which ultimately, I reckon, depends on maintaining open channels of communication with the bottom of one's heart.

For verily, to revert to an earlier idiom, and from a non-contemporary, but close, account of the words of a self-defined 'Son of Man', the kingdom of heaven lies within you.

Btw, I dislike terms such as 'belief' (or blind faith) that are bandied about: I believe this, I believe that: What does this mean? It means "I'm not prepared to think about it any further". And it probably means you're using the language in an habitual manner with too little attention to accuracy of expression.

The preliminary deal covers 330 mortgage bond trusts issued between 2005 and 2008, JPMorgan said in a statement yesterday. The accord still needs approval from trustees overseeing those securities and may be subject to court review, JPMorgan said.

The agreement adds to the litany of litigation expenses absorbed by JPMorgan, the largest U.S. bank. Last month, the company agreed to pay $5.1 billion for claims that the lender misrepresented mortgage bonds sold to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Chief Executive Officer Jamie Dimon has warned that more legal disputes lay ahead, and the bank has disclosed at least eight Department of Justice investigations.

“With every one of these that gets settled, we are theoretically closer to the end,” said Nancy Bush, a bank analyst who founded NAB Research LLC in New Jersey. “But the offset is that every one of these settlements seems to beget yet another lawsuit from somebody else. I’m losing track of them, we need a scorecard.”

Captain Robert Mayne stands at the wheel as he guides the steel-hulled Aqua Quest from the docks in the Florida Keys, pointing the vessel toward what he’s been assured is a gold-laden shipwreck that may be worth tens of millions of dollars.

Mayne, 60, says experience has taught him such gold hunts can be perilous: inspiring obsession, sending treasure hunters on endless journeys and blinding them to reason.

“Gold makes people crazy,” says Mayne, who in his youth smuggled marijuana, and now has neatly combed, greying hair. “They become lost in their dream.”

Even he finds the pull irresistible. Investors who hold rights to the site southwest of Key West say it may be the resting place of a galleon sunk by a 1622 hurricane. Mayne has agreed to cover the cost of the excursion in exchange for half of any treasure.

29. FRANCE'S PLEYEL PIANO MAKER PLAYS FINAL NOTE

A Pleyel piano is displayed in a piano store, in Paris, Saturday, Nov. 16, 2013. Gone are its glory days, when Chopin composed concertos on its pianos. France’s Pleyel piano maker is shutting its doors, unable to keep up with cheaper and more agile competition. (AP Photo/Thibault Camus)

PARIS (AP) -- Gone are its glory days, when Chopin composed concertos on its pianos. France's Pleyel piano maker is shutting its doors, unable to keep up with cheaper and more agile competition.

Down to just 14 employees after a 206-year history that produced more than 250,000 pianos, the Pleyel piano factory in Saint Denis, north of Paris, announced this week that it's closing "because of recurrent losses and a very low level of activity."

Like so many industries that Europe once dominated, today the piano market has moved east, grown more democratic, and gone digital. A study by ResearchMoz says China is the world's biggest producer and consumer of pianos, many of them budget or electronic models.

The company was founded in 1807 by Ignaz Pleyel, a composer and music publisher who studied with Franz Joseph Haydn. The factory became a leader in acoustic innovation in its heyday, coming out with new models as technology advanced. Its factory made instruments for music greats Chopin, Lizst, Ravel and Stravinsky.

"When I feel I feel energetic and strong enough to find my own sound, I need a Pleyel piano," said Chopin, who collected commissions from the company for prompting others to buy instruments.

***governments should be reluctant to let historically important companies -- like plyel or textiles to disappear.

32. All of a Sudden Students Have Stopped Paying Their Loans, Again—Why?

The first six months of 2013 brought us a small measure of good news about student loans: the delinquency rate, while still far too high for comfort, was falling.

Sadly, that's no longer the case. As shown on the graph below, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York reports that 11.8% of outstanding loan balances were 90 days or more past due by the end of September, a new post-recession high.

This could just be a temporary blip. Or, it could be a sign that the problems with student lending are still going to linger with us even while the economy heals, as students who graduated (or dropped out) into the anemic post-recession economy fall behind on their debt. In any event, it's disconcerting, not to mention a reminder that Congress might want to consider stepping in and doing something sooner rather than later.

44. Slow process of global dislocation now in progress (LEAP/E2020)

“It was night, and the rain fell; and, falling, it was rain, but, having fallen, it was blood.” These words of Edgar Allan Poe (1) apply perfectly to the slow process of global dislocation now in progress, where seemingly innocuous events – like the “rain” – combine to undermine the foundations of an international system that is dying, hence the “blood.” If the process is slow, if the events seem trivial, it is paradoxically because the crisis is the first truly global systemic crisis, one much deeper than the one in 1929, affecting all countries and overwhelming the heart of the system. Whereas 1929 was the adolescent crisis of a new world power, the US, we now experience the last days of an incurable, and incurable that had been the world’s sole superpower since 1945. But the whole organization of the world was built around the US, and it is no one’s interests for it to collapse before a complete decoupling. So it is for everyone to safeguard the usual appearances while ensuring a smooth transition, which explains the slow crash in progress...

... China is the master of this art, but we can see that all other countries are moving away from the US, in a more or less subtle fashion, like Saudi Arabia for example. (2) For the EU, one of the last Americanist bastions outside the US itself, the task is more difficult. Our team anticipates that the European elections of 2014, along with the inevitable rise of extreme right-wing and euroskeptic forces, will lead to an implosion of the current EU framework, with the possibility for Euroland to fill in the place...

The rapid internationalization of the Yuan, causing a decline in the central role of the dollar; the loss of Saudi support, a key part of the petrodollar edifice; and the loss of the Americanist bastion of the EU, replaced by a Euroland relying on the Euro, are all threats to the three remaining essential pillars of American power, which will disappear in 2014, precipitating considerable global upheaval.

The US is betting that the potential barrier (3) between the status quo and the world thereafter is too painful to go through, and that countries, despite all of the benefits that would accrue in the new organization of the world, will not cross that Rubicon. One example is China, with its mountains of dollars in reserve which would not be worth much if it moves too pointedly; another is Saudi Arabia, which would lose a good customer and assured security if it let go of the US. But these are neither more nor less than cold calculations of costs and benefits, and for a number of stakeholders the benefits will exceed the costs. According to LEAP/E2020, the American wager has already been lost...

51. Euro Crisis Reprieve: End to Bailout Programs Signals Recovery

The summer of 2012 was horrific for Europe. The euro zone seemed on the verge of collapse, investors were reluctant to lend money to debt-burdened countries and interest on Spanish and Italian bonds breached the psychologically critical 7-percent mark. A €100-billion ($135-billion) emergency loan package to Spanish banks hardly calmed the tension. And things looked even worse for Greece, which seemed incapable of fulfilling the demands of its creditors. German Economy Minister Philipp Rösler voiced the idea throwing Greece out of the euro zone, but not even Germany was immune to the chaos after Moody's threatened to downgrade the country's top credit rating because of a potential spill-over effect.

That was all about 16 months ago, and the euro zone now appears to be in much better health. Finance ministers from the 17 countries that use the common currency met in Brussels on Thursday to discuss releasing Ireland and Spain from their respective bailouts.

Irish Prime Minister Enda Kenny had announced before the meeting that his country would begin raising its own money and financing itself again by late January or early February. It even passed on a just-in-case emergency credit line offered by European partners. In 2010 Ireland had accepted a €67.5-billion line of emergency credit from the European Union and International Monetary Fund after interest rates on the open market became unsustainable.

Spain, too, is expecting an end to its bailout program, which was given straight to struggling banks rather than the government. Ultimately the country's banking sector needed only €40 billion of the €100 billion offered.

52. Turkish Discontent: Gezi Protests Spawn New Party

Gezi stands for democracy. For freedom. For having a political say and personal responsibility. For parks and trees. And for daring to say "no" to those in power. And for being able to believe in, hope for and love whatever you wish, exactly as you please. That's what makes it a bit of a miracle that suddenly all sorts of different people were uniting behind a common goal.

But Gezi has run out of steam. The protests that were sparked when Turkey's government announced plans to raze Gezi Park, one of the last green spaces in the center of the European part of Istanbul, and replace it with a shopping center, have now subsided. In June, thousands took to the streets, first in Istanbul, and then throughout the entire country. Now, the demonstrations are few and far between.

"That's exactly why we've decided that we have to take it a step further and found a party," says Cem Köksal. The 37-year-old with shoulder-length brown hair is greeted by young people on the streets here in the Kadiköy district of Istanbul. Köksal is a rock musician and guitarist who also writes and produces music. He and his comrades-in-arms want to challenge Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Their plan is to grow a political force from the seeds of a pro-democracy movement.

"Erdogan said to us demonstrators that we shouldn't protest on the street, but instead stand for election if we want to change something," says Teoman Kumbaracibasi, 42. "That's us!" Known as "Teo," he is also widely known as an actor on a TV series.

54. {oh brother}Here's How Tim Geithner Can Help The Private Equity Firm He Just Joined

This is not going to be some figurehead part-time job. According to the firm he'll be working every day, reporting to the co-CEOs.

So what's Tim Geithner going to do there? Almost certainly what he brings to the table will be his ability to fundraise. As Treasury Secretary he went all around the world, meeting the most powerful and rich people. All of them are theoretically investors in Warburg Pincus' PE funds now. Furthermore, part of Geithner's job as Treasury Secretary was to make the case for the US (explain why our debt was a good investment, etc.). So really this is the perfect job for him. While it's definitely "monetizing" his years of service to Obama, the fact that he's unlikely to be dealing much with regulatory matters means there will not be many conflict-of-interest situations.

So again, as cash-ins go, this one actually takes advantage of his skills, and is relatively uncontroversial.

56. Republicans Asserting Reliance on Gold as World Loses Faith

As the price of gold hit new highs following the 2008 financial crisis, Republicans saw the yellow metal’s steady ascent as a sign of trouble ahead.

To Representative Paul Ryan of Wisconsin, record gold prices in 2010 heralded “a lower standard of living for many Americans.”
Representative Ted Poe of Texas foresaw “a blast of inflation that will crush the middle class” adding: “Where gold prices go, other prices follow.” Fellow Texas Representative Ron Paul, a perennial critic of the Federal Reserve, warned that “confidence is being lost in the entire fiat monetary system,” a reference to money created by central banks.

The Republicans’ confidence in gold as an economic and financial barometer proved ill-founded. Five years after the crisis, the dollar’s value measured against the currencies of major U.S. trading partners is little changed. Prices have risen at an annual 1.4 percent rate, less than half the 50-year average and lower than the Fed’s 2 percent target.

By July, gold had slid 36 percent from its September 2011 high of more than $1,900 an ounce, the steepest percentage decline since prices plunged by 58 percent over 21 months ending in June 1982.

57. Obamacare Deductibles 26% Higher Make Cheap Rates a Risk

Americans seeking cheap insurance on the Obamacare health exchanges may be in for sticker shock if they get sick next year, as consumers trade lower premiums for out-of-pocket costs that can top $6,000 a person.

Expenses for some policies can reach $6,350 for a single person and $12,700 per family, the most allowed by the health-care law, according to a survey by HealthPocket Inc. of seven states, including California and Ohio. That’s 26 percent higher than the average deductible in the seven states, and a scenario likely repeated across the country, said Kev Coleman, head of research and data at Sunnyvale, California-based HealthPocket.

Private employers have been raising deductibles and co-pays for years to help control costs on health coverage for their workers. Now insurers are using the tactic to lower premiums on the government-run exchanges. While that has allowed President Barack Obama to tout the affordability of plans, it poses a choice: Do consumers gamble they won’t face a major medical bill, or boost monthly premiums just in case?

“If you have to pay $5,000 upfront” when illness hits, “you might as well not have any insurance at all,” said Larry Saphire, 82, of West Orange, New Jersey, who shopped for coverage for his wife and two children, ages 16 and 21. “That’s not insurance.”

58. New SAC E-Mails Given Martoma as Steinberg Heads to Trial

SAC Capital Advisors LP e-mails and other documents found on “newly discovered” backup tapes from 2007 and 2008 were turned over to a former fund manager accused of insider trading, his lawyer said.

Mathew Martoma’s legal team received 114,757 pages of the documents this week, the lawyer, Richard Strassberg, said in a letter yesterday to U.S. District Judge Paul Gardephe in Manhattan. Strassberg is seeking a two-week delay of Martoma’s Jan. 6 trial. He said he needs the additional time to analyze the new evidence and prepare witnesses.

“Certain of these materials appear directly relevant to specific allegations made against Mr. Martoma,” Strassberg said in the letter.

Michael Steinberg, another SAC money manager, is set to go on trial on insider-trading charges next week in Manhattan. Steinberg, who worked at SAC’s Sigma Capital Management unit, is charged with trading on inside tips he got from convicted SAC technology analyst Jon Horvath.

59. afghanistan, after the war boom

In 2001, U.S.-led NATO forces invaded Afghanistan to hunt down Al Qaeda and take down the Taliban government. In the years that followed, fifty-four billion dollars came into the country in the form of economic aid and military spending. War-related industries sprouted and prospered: construction, logistics, and security. The country’s official per-capita G.D.P. more than quadrupled from 2001 to 2010. There was rampant corruption and graft, but the country also saw concrete improvements: The maternal mortality rate dropped by half from 2000 to 2011, and life expectancy rose by nearly four years over that period.

This year, Afghanistan’s G.D.P. is expected to grow 3.7 per cent, down from growth of twelve per cent in 2012, according to a projection by the World Bank. In Kabul, drug addicts can be seen squabbling over heroin at traffic islands in broad daylight, and day laborers mill around on street corners, desperate for low-paying work. “The thing about a bubble is that it bursts,” Kate Clark, a senior analyst with the Afghanistan Analysts Network, said. “Some things you don’t lose, like education or aspiration,” Clark said. But she wonders what will happen to the young men and women who have reaped the benefits of the past decade and gotten used to comfortable lives replete with education and employment opportunities. “Particularly when you have so many young men out in the job market like we have now, I think there is going to be trouble ahead,” she told me.

When I was house-hunting in Kabul earlier this year, most of the available properties were the abandoned facilities of long-departed international organizations. They were compounds with servants’ quarters and gussied-up gardens, houses meant for a different era, when it seemed like the wartime wealth would carry on forever.

In the chill of a mid-March morning, I climbed inside one of Kabul’s many vacant structures to meet some members of the middle class. The bare scaffolding of a construction site was serving as an informal shelter for men who had traveled from the provinces in search of jobs. Many were university-educated professionals who had Facebook accounts and listened to the BBC.

64. I'm still alive

bad rains, bad winds, tornado watch, lightning...I drove to Lansing and back in it. Took a lot longer, though. There were stretches where I couldn't see more than 30 feet ahead, it was raining so hard.

The new stretch of road we put in drains beautifully...the rest of the place is rising seas with visible waves driven by the wind. It's going to be a long 10 years. My road is going to be done last, because 4 board members live on it, and it would look really, really bad to do ours early.